'', etching, 1757 Even though the social structure by an aristocracy remained rigid and oppressive, Venice revived through the
Grand Tour as the center of intellectual and international exchange in the eighteenth century. The ideas of the
Enlightenment stimulated theorists and artists all over Europe including Paris, Dresden, and London. New forms of artistic expression emerged: veduta, capriccio, and veduta ideata, topographical view, architectural fantasy, accurate renderings of ancient monuments assembled with imaginary compositions in response to the demand of increased visitors. The developing center of the Grand Tour was Rome. Rome became a new meeting place and intellectual capital of Europe for the leaders of a new movement in the arts. The city was attracting artists and architects from all over Europe beside the Grand Tourists, dealers and antiquarians. While many came through official institutions such as the
French Academy in Rome, others came to see the new discoveries at
Herculaneum and
Pompeii. Coffee shops were frequent gathering places, most famously the
Antico Caffè Greco, established 1760. The Caffe degli Inglesi opened several years later, at the foot of the
Spanish Steps in
Piazza di Spagna, with wall paintings by Piranesi. With his own print workshop and museum of antiquities nearby, Piranesi was able to cultivate relationships in both places with wealthy buyers on the tour, particularly English. The remains of Rome kindled Piranesi's enthusiasm. Informed by his experience in Venice and his study of the works of
Marco Ricci and particularly
Giovanni Paolo Panini, he appreciated not only the engineering of the ancient buildings but also the poetic aspects of the ruins. He was able to faithfully imitate the actual remains; his invention in catching the
design of the original architect provided the missing parts. His masterful skill at engraving introduced groups of vases, altars, tombs that were absent in reality; his manipulations of scale; and his broad and scientific distribution of light and shade completed the picture, creating a striking effect from the whole view. at
Benevento'', etching A number of the
Views are notable for depicting human figures whose poverty, lameness, apparent drunkenness, and other visible flaws appear to echo the decay of the ruins. This is consistent with a familiar trope of Renaissance literature, in which the ruins of Rome are lamented as a metaphor for the imperfection and transience of human existence. Some of his later work was completed by his children and several pupils. Piranesi's son and coadjutor,
Francesco, collected and preserved his plates, in which the freer lines of the etching-needle largely supplemented the severity of
burin work. Twenty-nine folio volumes containing about 2000 prints appeared in Paris (1835–1837). is pictured with the Church of
Santi Luca e Martina and the
Column of Phocas, all situated in the
Roman Forum. The late
Baroque works of
Claude Lorrain,
Salvator Rosa, and others had featured romantic and fantastic depictions of ruins; in part as a
memento mori or as a reminiscence of a golden age of construction. Piranesi also made copies of a number of etchings by
Israel Silvestre, whose works he apparently admired. Piranesi's reproductions of real and recreated Roman ruins were a strong influence on
Neoclassicism. One of the main features of Neo-Classicism is the attitude towards nature and the uses of the past. Neo-Classicism was prompted by the discoveries at
Herculaneum and
Pompeii. Rediscovery and revaluation of the art and architecture of Greece, Egypt, and Gothic continued throughout the century. The view of a Golden Age was changing from static to mutable, inspired by Rousseau and Winckelmann in response to the dynamic growth of society. The wider perspective on the past created a new way of expression. Artists developed a greater self-consciousness in confronting the limited authority of the ancient world, and there was a growing interest in civilizations and the destiny of nations. Piranesi was especially interested in the Graeco-Roman debate in the 1760s, between followers of Winckelmann who thought Greek culture and architecture superior to their Roman counterparts, and those who (like Piranesi) believed that the Romans had improved upon their Greek models. His free relationship to the past may be summarized in a phrase of his that become a mantra: "col sporcar si trova"; "by messing about, one discovers". Throughout his lifetime, Piranesi created numerous prints depicting the Eternal City; these were widely collected by gentlemen on the Grand Tour. The Lobkowicz Collections, housed at the
Lobkowicz Palace in
Prague, contains a group of twenty-six of his engravings. == The
Prisons (
Carceri) ==